PROPER 29C2

CHRIST THE KING SUNDAY

NOVEMBER 23, 2025

FR. JERRY THOMPSON

ST. JAMES’ CHURCH, FREMONT, NE

Today is the Last Sunday After Pentecost,

also known as Christ the King Sunday.

I want to remind us of the prayer we offered just a few minutes ago.

We asked God to

“mercifully grant that the peoples of the earth,

“divided and enslaved by sin,

“may be freed and brought together

“under the most gracious rule

“of your beloved Son,

who is “the king of kings

“and Lord of Lords.”

The whole idea of kings has been very much

in our cultural face this year,

what with the No Kings Days and No Kings Marches.

These days and events have arisen, of course,

in response to a president and federal administration

which likes to assume more authority

over the lives of our nation’s citizens -

over us -

than is granted by our Constitution

and the laws that govern our land.

The president’s attitude conflicts not only with the laws of our nation

but also with our nation’s history.

We deliberately threw off the tyranny of an unjust ruler -

an unjust king -

two and half centuries ago,

to establish a new and different kind of governing structure.

That structure contains checks and balances against the kind of turmoil

that Donald Trump and his administration are creating in the lives of US citizens;

at least that’s the case

when those structures are functioning in a healthy fashion,

a fashion faithful to the Constitution itself.

Right now, the structures of our nation are being severely tested and strained.

For Christians this morning,

on Christ the King Sunday,

there is a sense in which that history is irrelevant.

After all, people have held faith in Jesus Christ

in many different forms of government

for nearly ten times longer than the United States has been around.

The Christian faith has existed in governments

ruled by tyrants and autocrats before,

and at times true followers of Jesus have been mistreated and even killed 

during those reigns of evil.

They were abused and they were killed because – in the face of evil –

they treated Jesus Christ as the one who had authority over their lives

and over their nation,

not some passing autocrat who was demanding that their allegiance

be shifted from Christ to himself.

Many Christians have faithfully chosen

the way of the cross,

just as Jesus does,

in the face of having to choose between the cross and the crown.

They made that choice out of deeply held faith in the God and Father of Jesus.

They knew the righteous path of our God,

and they were determined to follow it then

just as we are called to follow it now.

The Christian faith and followers of Jesus

who share his passion and love for all human beings -

especially those on the margins of society

and those most in need -

those of us who align our lives with the values of Jesus and his gospel:

we have also existed in governments more congenial to the Christian faith,

and more welcoming to those of us who truly strive

to follow the way of the Christian God.

Reigns, arguably, such as the Roman Empire under Constantine,

who recognized in the Chrisian faith something different,

and a king to whom he himself finally relented on his death bed.

And in medieval Europe,

when Christian values were,

when held by the holiest of people in power,

these values were used to serve the people with whom they were entrusted,

to care for them and improve the quality of their lives.

Even at various times in our own country,

under various administrations,

both Republican and Democrat,

leaders have chosen –

as themselves good and faithful stewards of the gifts given them by Christ -

they’ve chosen to use the power granted them

to serve the people entrusted to their care.

Unfortunately, under the leadership of our current federal government,

our nation is becoming increasingly unwelcoming to followers of Jesus,

even antagonistic to us and hateful toward us.

It has become increasingly impossible to serve the God and Father of Jesus Christ and, at the same time,

to support our current federal government;

to uphold its actions and behaviors,

its lawlessness,

and its cruel and callous treatment of other human beings.

A reign of terror is not something that Christians can be part of,

not if they are truly striving to pick up their cross and follow Jesus,

truly aiming to serve our Lord and our God,

the one who is truly king of kings and lord of lords.

That reality puts Christians like ourselves -

like the Episcopal Church and its members -

we who stand in a line of tradition

reaching back to Jesus and the apostles

and who claim our moral authority from them -

the reality in which we live

places us in a highly awkward position,

to put it mildly.

Most of us want to serve Jesus with all our hearts.

Some of us have even found serving our country as a way to do that.

But increasingly,

serving our country can very sadly place us at odds with serving Jesus,

because our current leadership

fails to recognize his authority

in their lives and the life of all creation.

Someone or something is always going to be ultimate in our lives,

the monarch who directs our lives.

And when we make ourselves that king

rather than Christ,

we are doomed to failure.

When we make ourselves our King,

the final authority in our lives,

we are doomed to failure,

because we are not the final authority.

We never will be. 

All of us are accountable to God,

answerable to God,

and God is the only ruler of any life, or any nation.

That’s what Christ the King Sunday is about.

It’s about marking,

and celebrating,

and submitting

to the rule of Christ in our personal lives,

in the life of our nation,

and in the life of all creation.

Otherwise, we are not truly following him.

We know that,

and more importantly,

he knows that,

he who is our king,

the ultimate source of authority for what we choose to say and do

with the precious lives he has given us.

We choose to have Christ as our king,

to follow him,

because we believe that,

when push comes to shove,

Christ’s reign -

Christ’s kingship and lordship,

Christ’s authority over all things –

the authority that lovingly forgives on the cross,

reconciles all peoples and nations,

and promises justice for all -

we believe that authority is what holds everything else together,

he holds all things together

including all the passing kingdoms of the earth,

including the Roman Empire,

and medieval Europe,

and the Unted States of America,

even at this fragile moment.

All those other reigns,

all those other kingdoms,

all those other authorities,

they passed and they will pass.

Only the reign of Christ is eternal.

Part of what we are experiencing as a nation

is a backlash to the way things are changing,

the way this passing kingdom is changing

and becoming something else,

something different

than the last 250 years,

a time in which people who look like me –

like all of us, for that matter –

held the power.

White people,

with our particular take on goodness,

a take which has not always been holy

nor always of God.

 Sometimes yes. Sometimes no.

But the desire to cling onto something that once was,

to control the movement of the Holy Spirit in the world,

the Holy Spirit who works to bring about greater good

for more and more people –

for all people -

such an effort is doomed to failure.

We can’t expect to go up against the Holy Spirit of God and be victorious.

We will only lose.

For it is we who are expected to conform to the ways of God,

not the other way around.

That is what we accept,

what we sign onto,

when we acknowledge that Christ is King

over our meager lives

and over the life of the entire creation.

We choose each day to be part of God’s work and God’s reign

in this world,

right here and right now.

Today in the United States, very sadly,

that choice demands of us

that we speak and act courageously

on behalf of those fellow human beings

whom our government is attacking.

Perhaps even giving witness to our faith in Christ

if we find ourselves attacked.

Because you and I know only one King.

We follow only one ruler.

And his name is Jesus Christ.

May the name of Jesus be held high in our hearts

and on our lips

and in our actions

this Christ the King Sunday –and every day we are granted breath

in this world that belongs not to us,

but to him.                              

 Amen.